Science Fiction as a Genre

A. Sample Definitions:

According to Rabkin, "science fiction is a branch of fantastic literature that takes scientific knowledge as its background."

Brian W. Aldiss: Science fiction is the search for definition of man and his status in the universe which will stand in our advanced but confused state of knowledge (science), and is characteristically cast in the Gothic or post-Gothic mould. -- Trillion Year Spree: the History of Science Fiction (London, 1986)

Dick Allen “Is it any wonder that a new generation has rediscovered science fiction, rediscovered a form of literature that argues through its intuitive force that the individual can shape and change and influence and triumph; that man can eliminate both war and poverty; that miracles are possible; that love, if given a chance, can become the main driving force of human relationships?”
Kingsley Amis: Science Fiction is that class of prose narrative treating of a situation that could not arise in the world we know, but which is hypothesized on the basis of some innovation in science or technology, or pseudo-technology, whether human or extra-terresial in origin. -- New Maps Of Hell (London, 1960)
Benjamin Appel: Science fiction reflects scientific thought; a fiction of things-to-come based on things-on-hand. -- The Fantastic Mirror-SF Across The Ages (Panthenon 1969)
Isaac Asimov: Modern science fiction is the only form of literature that consistently considers the nature of the changes that face us, the possible consequences, and the possible solutions. That branch of literature which is concerned with the impact of scientific advance upon human beings. -- (1952)
James O. Bailey: The touchstone for scientific fiction, then, is that it describes an imaginary invention or discovery in the natural sciences. The most serious pieces of this fiction arise from speculation about what may happen if science makes an extraordinary discovery. The romance is an attempt to anticipate this discovery and its impact upon society, and to foresee how mankind may adjust to the new condition. -- Pilgrims Through Space and Time (New York, 1947)
Ray Bradbury: Science fiction is really sociological studies of the future, things that the writer believes are going to happen by putting two and two together.
Paul Brians: [Science Fiction is:]a subdivision of fantastic literature which employs science or rationalism to create an appearance of plausibility.-- Posted to the mailing list SF-LIT, May 16, 1996

B. Sub-Genres: Science fiction literature is vast and diverse and include subspecies like,

Sword-and-Sorcery,
alternate time streams,
utopian and dystopian literature,
speculative fiction,
lyric romance,
and doomsday fiction.
The novels and short stories offer powerful fantasies, mystic experience, intellectual challenge, and always excitement—almost beyond definition.

C. Social Sciences and Science Fiction:

The best way to define science fiction is to approach it through sociology, since it meets the needs of an audience (or audiences).
Early science fiction from Poe and Hawthorne may meet the needs of literate readers of Calvino and Pynchon today.
But what about readers of Verne and Wells, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Heinlein?

D. Other Genres of Science Fiction:

Brian Aldiss writes of science fiction as a variety of Gothic romance, emphasizing literary heritage and typical moods of science fiction.
Darko Suvin calls science fiction the literature of "cognitive estrangement," emphasizing the intellectual devices of science fiction.

E. A Synthesis:

All definitions seem to rely on the recognition that the worlds of science fiction are, often aggressively, not our worlds and yet, often quite subtly, the worlds of our inner doubts and wishes.

The purest definition was that an ideal work of science fiction made one and only one assumption, presumably based on an unlikely but not absolutely impossible scientific notion, and "extrapolated" a narrative world from that, keeping all other rules of our world otherwise unchanged. Although no extended work ever fulfilled that definition, Wells's novels came close. The Time Machine (1895) postulates the vehicle of its title, but the projected futures it reveals are based in ideas about human nature and society widely held at the time of writing.

The assumptions made by sci fi are usually those that induce "wonder" or at least supply us with drama so exaggerated that the symbolic power of the tale is assured: Frankenstein's demon walks through our culture and Superman flies over it. Because the symbols of sci fi are so palpable, they sometimes seem unsubtle; delicacy of characterization does seem to fade in this strong light. It is often criticized as literature more concerned with "ideas" than with "characters."

The quest for knowing is the theme of much of sci fi literature, a fundamental aspect of the tale of the Fall, of the myth of Prometheus, of the versions of Faust and of all narratives of initiation and coming of age.

The characters live in dramas that speak to our whole culture or to whole aspects of the human condition, rather than to the particularities of a brief cultural moment intersecting a person at a fleeting stage of life.

Sci fi is removed to the there-and-then, the distant land or planet or galaxy, the future or past or sidewhen.

Because such removal inevitably affords contrast, exaggerated contrast, with our own world, sci fi becomes a literature not only of wonder, but of commentary, not perhaps of character analysis, but of serious inquiry. Sci fi may help readers explore their world, their society, their life, their vocation—these are among the highest uses of art.

Margaret Tarrat claims that even though "the majority of science fiction films appear to express some kind of concern with the moral state of contemporary society, many are more directly involved with an examination of our inner nature" (330). As a way to explore multiple constructions of the "self," we can "read" science fiction film and literature that, like Frankenstein, provide openings to both psychology and psychiatry. Through an analysis of form and style in film and lit students will, I hope, answer questions regarding the "deep and fearful concern with the foundations of the self" (Siodmak 331).

Powerpoint Overviews:
Science Fiction Introduction